The use of credit, debit and purchase cards has become increasingly popular in recent years, due in part to their widespread acceptance by vendors and their ease of use. However, that very popularity has led to issues such as identity theft and other types of fraud. Another issue is their ease of use makes it easy for the user to lose track of the purchases they have made, and by extension, the amount of their available credit or bank balances, which can result in a deleterious effect on budget management. Yet another issue is the lack of controls over what the card can be used for, as well as where and when.
As an example, it is not uncommon for students to be provided a credit or debit card by their parents for making allowed purchases such food, fuel, school supplies, and other allowable expenses. However, the parent must rely on the student to not use the card for other purchases, such as clothing, entertainment, or perhaps other, less desirable purchases such as tobacco and alcoholic products. Furthermore, the parent must likewise rely on the student not to use the card outside of a predetermined geographical area, such as a neighborhood or a sector of a city. Yet another concern parents may have is that the student may attempt to use the card in a high crime area, thereby exposing themselves to danger. As another example, a company may issue a credit or purchase card to an employee to make approved purchases. Currently, administering and managing compliance to corporate purchase policies is typically after the fact, not before the employee attempts to make an unapproved purchase. As yet another example, consumers and businesspeople alike have difficulty adhering to a budget when using a card to make purchases, as it is difficult to determine in real-time how much they have already spent for a given budget category. Instead, they are often dismayed to discover they have overspent once they receive their statements.
Known approaches to some of these issues exist, including limiting the use of a credit or debit card to certain geographical areas or time of day. Other known approaches provide item-level purchase detail, but these approaches are generally used for after-the-fact accounting and reconciliation purposes. Yet other approaches disallow the use of a card for different classes of merchants. However, such controls are typically not granular enough to be effective. As an example, clothing and alcoholic beverages can be purchased at many grocery stores.
Furthermore, no known approach provides multi-factor and granular purchase controls related to geographical location, time of day, merchant type, product type, or purchase amount. Moreover, no known approach combines such granular purchase controls with notification of an attempted purchase of a disallowed or unapproved purchase item.